Thursday, June 1, 2017

Evergreen State College Student Takeover After Day of Absence For Whites Controversy

April 2017 Powers says that about 200 staff, faculty and students — out of roughly 4,800 at Evergreen — left campus to take part in this year’s Day of Absence. Previous to this year, the Day of Absence has involved some students, faculty and staff of color voluntarily gathering off campus for activities related to that cause, while white students, staff and faculty were able to voluntarily participate in related activities on campus. request was made to change things up to allow participants of color to hold Day of Absence activities on campus, while white participants who chose to participate were asked to remain off campus.Olympian

As Lisa Pemberton of The Olympian reported, hundreds of students took part in a demonstration on the Wednesday, May 24. They filled the third floor of Evergreen’s library building and surrounded president George Bridges’ office. To say things got heated and that language not fit for publication here was used probably is an understatement. Olympian

Evergreen State students demand professor resign for ...
Washington Times · 7 days ago
May 25, 2017 · (Evergreen State College ... a “Day of Absence & Day of Presence ... students later that day, university President George S. …Over the last 72 hours, students have taken over a small liberal arts college in Washington state, and only one adult has tried to stop them.
Students at Evergreen State College in Olympia, who filmed their exploits and posted the videos on social media, have occupied and barricaded the library, shouting down anyone who disagrees with them or shows insufficient passion for racial justice.
Biology professor Bret Weinstein was berated by dozens of students outside of his classroom Tuesday morning for refusing to participate in an event in which white people were invited to leave campus for a day. Now, he says police have told him to hold his classes off campus due to safety concerns.
Things are “out of control at Evergreen,” he said.
“Police told me protesters stopped cars yesterday, demanding information about occupants,” Mr. Weinstein told The Washington Times. “They believe I was being sought

His email took issue with a “Day of Absence & Day of Presence” demonstration, for which white students, faculty and staff were asked to leave campus for one day.
He wrote: “On a college campus, one’s right to speak — or to be — should never be based on skin color.”

“The students, fearful for their lives, began retreating towards the library and ultimately ended up in the Trans & Queer Center/Unity Lounge, trying to stay safe,” Mr. Vincent said in a Facebook post Tuesday

“there have been and will be more walk-ins into different faculty’s classrooms.”

https://heatst.com/culture-wars/evergreen-state-activists-demand...
Student activists at Evergreen State College have been ... and demanded the university to launch an ... Day of Absence at Evergreen typically involves ...tudent activists at Evergreen State College have been campaigning to get one of the school’s professors fired for his refusal to support a proposed Day of Absence, in which white students would be banned from attending the school for a day.

This week, the activists demanded that the video of their campaign be taken down from the Internet—because they claim it was “stolen” by “white supremacists.”

The video of the students’ shrieking arguments and attempts to bully the professor into agreeing with them made the rounds on social media, causing humiliation for both Evergreen and the student activists involved in the debacle. The mob demanded his resignation following the spread of the video. Police told Prof. Bret Weinstein that he would not be safe on campus if he returned, prompting him to teach class at a nearby park.

“We demand that the video created for Day of Absence and Day of Presence that was stolen by white supremacists and edited to expose and ridicule the students and staff be taken down by the administration by this Friday,” the students demanded from college president George Bridges, the College Fix reports.

Day of Absence at Evergreen typically involves one gender or race deciding that it wants to remove itself from campus for a day—to show the remaining students what life is like without them. But this year, there was a twist: Black students, instead of removing themselves, demanded that white students leave for the day. Prof. Weinstein denounced the idea, which led to him being bullied and threatened.

e story of Professor Bret Weinstein, who has been forced to hold his biology class sessions off campus due to security concerns as a result of the backlash, has yet to be reported in many major news outlets. Fox News’ Tucker Carlson has interviewed Weinstein, but at the time of this writing the New York Times, the Associated Press, NBC News, and CNN are amongst the outlets that have yet to cover the protests that are calling for the suspension of a progressive biology professor who refused to participate in an activist event. A conservative-leaning legal blog at the Washington Post covered the story, expressing concern over the inaction of the Evergreen State College administration in protecting their professor from the security threat posed by the student protesters who are demanding his resignation.

rage against Weinstein on campus is the result of an email he sent opposing the school’s “Day of Absence” event, which, this year, involves asking white community members to leave campus. Weinstein argued in the email that the event’s structure, which asks a group that did not participate in the event’s planning to leave campus, is “an act of oppression in and of itself.”

Weinstein appeared on a live episode of The Rubin Report to discuss the controversy. In the interview, Weinstein claims that the student protesters allegedly discussed the possibility of kidnapping him.

Evergreen State College closes after ‘direct threat to campus safety’ Originally published June 1, 2017 at 11:22 am Updated June 1, 2017 at 12:56 pm
Students leave The Evergreen State College campus in Olympia after a threat prompted a student alert and evacuation on Thursday. Everyone was asked to leave the Olympia campus or return to residence halls for instructions, the college announced about 11 a.m. Thursday.

Someone called a local law-enforcement agency with a threat to the campus, Evergreen spokesman Zach Powers said.

The threat comes a week after hundreds of Evergreen students began protests over what they say is institutional racism at the college. The campus has experienced mounting racial tension that puts students of color at risk, a student group wrote in a news release last week.

Students cited several incidents, including alleged police assaults and an email from a professor who objected to the school’s “day of absence.” [which asked for all white persons leave the campus for a day instead of the usual interested minority students leaving for a day]

June 2, 2017 Seattle Times The Evergreen State College remains closed today after a "direct threat to campus safety." It’s unclear whether that's connected to recent protests by hundreds of students over what they call institutional racism, including a confrontation with a professor that gained national attention. Meanwhile, a Princeton professor who called Trump a "racist and sexist megalomaniac" has canceled her Seattle talk after death threats.

Caller threatens to ‘murder as many people as I can’ at Evergreen State College Seattle Times June 2, 2017 caller on Thursday threatened to “execute as many people on the campus as I can get ahold of,” and referred to Olympia as a “communist scumbag town.” The caller’s identity remains unknown. Thurston County Communications has released a recording of the threatening call that prompted the closure of The Evergreen State College on Thursday and Friday. “I’m on my way to Evergreen University (sic) now with a .44 Magnum,” the caller says in audio obtained by KIRO 7. “I’m going to execute as many people on the campus as I can get ahold of. You have that, what’s going on here, you communist scumbag town? I’m going to murder as many people on that campus as I can. Just keep your eyes open, scumbag.

History and Origins
The idea for the first Day of Absence came from a play of the same name by African American playwright, Douglas Turner Ward. Presented in 1965 as a “reverse minstrel show” (black actors in whiteface), the play is a social commentary on race relations in the U.S., and satirizes the South’s refusal to see African Americans as equal members of the community. In the play, a town wakes up to find all of its African American citizens have disappeared, leaving those left to reflect on the meaning of their community without these essential members.

The Day of Absence, as it was originally known, began in the 1970s when Faculty member Maxine Mimms, inspired by the play, approached administrator Stone Thomas about the idea of joining with other faculty and staff of color in spending a work day away from campus as a grassroots collective action. In the decades following, Day of Absence grew to become an opportunity for all students, faculty and staff at Evergreen to explore and celebrate the richness of our diversity by facilitating conversations about issues of difference. In 1992, Day of Presence was added in order to reunite the college community and honor diversity and unity as a whole campus.

Day of Absence and Day of Presence Today
Currently, although we still celebrate Day of Absence and Day of Presence with two full days of activities every Spring quarter, we also sponsor a variety of events and activities throughout the year created to hone our discussion and analytical skills in regards to the complex and vital issues of race, inclusion, diversity, privilege, allyship and their intersections.

Each year, the Day of Absence and Day of Presence Planning Committee develops a new program of events and workshops to address current issues surrounding race at Evergreen and beyond. This committee is open to the entire campus, and anyone who is interested is invited to participate.

At at Evergreen State College in Washington state,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2017/05/...
‘Professor told he’s not safe on campus after college protests’ at Evergreen State University ... (the theme of the Douglas Turner Ward play Day of Absence, ...